Q is for.. Quails and Queens!

     Boy oh boy… Qq is a hard one!  Although there are lots of great words that start with a Qq, finding books and crafts to go along with those words isn’t as easy.  After going through quarterback (last week WAS the Superbowl and being so close to Indianapolis, I thought this might be fun), quiet, quick, and quill, I FINALLY settled on quail and queen.  I really did NOT want to use queen because I wanted to remain gender-neutral for all the little boys in my classes, however, I just wasn’t able to think of another fun Qq craft that I could produce in mass quantities.  So queen is was!

     Our Q letter craft came from a website that was recently sent to me by a coworker.  I have used this site before and I just remembered that I have never credited it.  To find cute animal alphabet letters, click here.

 

Materials:  Index card with capital Q, googly eye, and crayons

 

Front of card

Back of card

1)    Color the capital Q to look like a quail.

2)    Trace the capital and lower case Qq on the back of the card.

3)    Attach the googly eye!

     As mentioned, the other craft this week was a queenly craft.  I gave the kids pre-cut crowns and had them “bedazzle” them with jewels and sequins.  For the boys, I reminded them that while only girls can be queens, kings and princes are just as royal and also have jewels on their crowns. I did, however, try to give the boys less “girly” colors, though I gave them the option of having pinks and purples if they wanted them!  See the crown Sammy is wearing in our video for an example!

     Have you ever looked for a picture book about quails?  Chances are, you aren’t going to find one! HINT HINT… authors and publishers, GET ON THAT!  In fact, I have a good friend who will be publishing a series of children's stories about zoo animals this year, perhaps I can talk her into publishing a book about a quail! Hear me Carolyn, I am going to need you to help a librarian out!

     Since I was unable to find a good quail book, I settled for two books on queens.  Both books are a little bit older, but fit the bill nicely.  The first book, The Queen’s Feet by Sarah Ellis was a funny little story about a royal whose feet are anything but royal.  The book has a great moral value in it about apologizing and trying one’s best to behave while ultimately realizing that every so often, we all need to let loose and have fun!

     The other queenly book we read was called The Queen’s Holiday by Margaret Wild.  With this book, the first thing I needed to explain was “holiday” in British English means vacation.  This was very important to understanding the book.  After that, all of the silly things the guards, the maid, the doctor, and the groom do make much more sense.  This book was a good, quick read, though the kids didn’t find it nearly as funny as I did, that is, until the royal potty made an appearance.  You will have to read the book to find out why in the world a royal potty would be needed!

     In keeping with the theme of music last, I thought I might introduce you all to a color song that I love!  I use this song for my baby class as well as my 2s and 3s sometimes.  I like this song because it first give the color, then asks you to find the object with the same color.  I use this song with puppets and give each kid a craft stick puppet with object on it.  That way, it becomes more of a “find the color” game and less like learning.

     Although Qq was a bit daunting, I think we got through it just fine!  We will be taking a break from our regularly programmed schedule to celebrate… VALENTINE’S Day.  I can absolutely promise you that I will not post a gooey, schmoopy, love post next week!  I like Valentine’s Day as much as the next person, but as my friend at Desperately Seeking Sparkle said, “I love to love all year round, not just on February 14th.”  Thanks, Emily for that great quote!  I hope you tune in next week to see what fun and amazing Valentine’s creations we come up with!

P is for... Penguins and Parachutes!

     For those of you that didn’t know this already, there are TONS of words that start with Pp.  My kids were able to come up with easily 20 or so.  Some of my favorites included Poppa, Popsicle, pineapple, polar bear, and Penelope!  It wouldn’t be Story Time if one of my kids didn’t throw out a name!  This week, though, I chose to play it safe and went with penguins and parachutes!

     Our P letter craft this week was rather fun, it took the shape of a penguin.  I love penguins!  When I was a kid, they were my absolute favorite part of the zoo.  To this day I can sit and watch the penguins for hours! They are absolutely mesmerizing.

Materials:  Index card with capital P, googly eye, white foam belly, orange foam beak, orange foam feet, and crayons

Front of card

Back of card

1)    Color the capital P to look like a penguin (black works for the best effect).

2)    Trace the capital and lower case Pp on the back of the card.

3)    Glue the white foam belly to the P.  Add the google eye, orange foam beak and feet!  TA DA!  A pretty penguin!

     The second craft this week for my 4-6 years olds was a recycled craft.  By that I mean, we have done it before!  But, who cares!  I gave each of my kids a parachute man to color.  The parachute man had holes punched in his hands.  I then gave each kid two pieces of yarn to tie to the parachute man’s hand.  The other end of the string was tied to a plastic grocery bag (parachute.)  WARNING:  I know that it is not safe to give children plastic bags.  In my case, the kids’ parents are in the room.  The bag was given to the parent with a general warning to not let their children play with this craft unsupervised.  The parachute man craft looked like this!

     As I mentioned previously, I like to challenge my older kids who come.  This week’s challenge was manual dexterity.  Tying those little knots was hard for me 4-6 year olds.  I encouraged each of them to try it on their own, and then ask for help when they needed it.  This is a practice I always like to use in class because encouraging independence is really important to me, especially for my 4-6 year olds.  Although many of these kids are in preschool, it won’t be long before they move into elementary school.  It’s a good practice for the kid and their parent as well!

     As I continue on my quest to ensure that my kids are loving the books I read, I think this week, I would get a barely passing grade.  Tony Baloney by Pam Ryan is a great book about a little macaroni penguin that seems to always be getting into trouble.  I picked it not only because it went with the theme, but also because I thought my kids could relate.  Perhaps it was a bit too long for a read-aloud or maybe they just didn’t get it, but my parents seemed to be laughing more than the kids.  That’s why I give it barely passing.  At least someone enjoyed it, right?

     Do you know how hard it is to find a good read-aloud about parachutes?  Well, my library didn’t have one and I was kind of in a pickle, so I went a different route, airplanes!  That’s right, airplanes!  The kids and I first talked about how parachutes are an important part of airplanes and why airplanes need them to make passengers feel safe.  This, however, segued nicely into my book, He Saves the Day by Marsha Hayles.  A good little book about imagination, adventure, asking for help, my kids really enjoyed He Saves the Day.

    It seems I always like to finish my blog posts with the new music we used that week.  This week, I chose a really fun and exciting song that I have used in the past.  If you have not heard of the Disney show “Phineas and Ferb” that you must be living under a rock!  Phineas and Ferb are everywhere and I love one of the songs they sang on their show, “Gitchie Gitchie Goo!”  It’s fun, upbeat, and catchy!  Trust me when I say this song will be stuck in your head for days if not weeks!

     The other song this week was more of an educational song.  I have been using this song for a few weeks and decided it was time to create a video!  Everyone knows the Addams Family theme song, right?  Well, some GENIUS created a Days of the Week song to go with it! I love it and I hope you do too!

     That's it! I'm done! I hope you enjoyed it!  Next week is the letter Q.. oh boy!  What am I going to do!?

O is for... Owls and Octopuses!

     First, let me start by saying yes, the plural form of octopus is octopuses according to the dictionary.  I thought it seemed a bit funny, so I looked it up, just to make sure!  Just for your personal information, the second plural form listed is octopi, which I like much better!  OH well!

     As you can see this week was all about the letter Oo, OKAY?  OBVIOUSLY, we focused OUR attentions ON OWLS and OCTOPUSES!  Look at all those Oo words!  OUR letter craft for this week looked like this.

Materials:  Index card with capital O, googly eyes, orange foam beak, and crayons

Front of card

Back of card

1)    Color the capital O.

2)    Trace the capital and lower case Oo on the back of the card.

3)    Peel and stick the googly eyes and orange beak on the owl.

     The second craft this week for my older kids was a lot of fun!  With my older kids, I like to try to add something new and different.  This week, our challenge was scissors.  That’s right, I let 4-6 year olds use scissors.  I have a bit of a luxury in my classes because their parents remain in the room with them.  Thus if something like scissors becomes too difficult for the child, their parent is always there to help out if need be.  I must say, however, that only one or two of my kids needed help.  As mentioned previously, my kids are all about their independence!  You can find out octopus craft here.  As you can see from the picture below, we changed ours up just a bit.  Instead of paint, we used markers.  However, I think they still turned out pretty cute!

This isn't the one we made.  Mine has gone missing!
But ours did come out looking like this!

     So, what fun books did we read this week?  The first book I picked was Frank Asch’s Bread and Honey.  When I first picked this book, I wasn’t quite sure how my kids would like it.  However, the premise of the book is quite funny and my kids laughed the whole way through it.  There is also a great underlying moral to the story!  I love when that happens.

     For the octopus book, we read My Very Own Octopus by Bernard Most.  Have you ever wanted and octopus for a pet?  In this funny book by Most, he goes through the best parts of having an octopus.  Can you imagine having a pet that can brush your hair, brush your teeth, and help you get dressed all at the same time?  I think I would like a pet like that!

    The last thing I always try to do is introduce “new” music to my kids.  The week, I took the plunge and introduced a new alphabet letter strip song.  For those of you who don’t know what I am talking about, in my classes we do an activity called the letter strip.  This is just a long strip of paper, laminated, with clip art pictures of the letter and then a picture.  My kids LOVE IT!  When I don’t do it, they whine and groan and moan, so I have to!  I have been using the same song for a little over a year, but I felt it was time to move on.  You can see the old song at my YouTube channel here.  The new song is the Richard Scarry Alphabet Song.  It is a little bit different than my previous alphabet song, but after a couple of weeks, I think my kids and their parents will begin to love it as well.

     As for other music, I also like to introduce my kids to kid-appropriate popular music.  I am a HUGE fan of the oldies.  I think playing the oldies is great because it gets both kid and parents engaged.  This week’s blast from the past came in the form of “I’m Walking on Sunshine,” by Katrina and the Waves.

     That seems to be all for this week.  Next week we tackle the letter P.  However, its Q that I am really worried about!  EEK!  Stay tuned in to see what we do!

N is for... Numbers and Noodles!

     Another week, another letter!  This week’s letter was multi-faceted.  As you can see from the video with Sammy the Toucan, as well as the blog title, this week wasn’t just about letters, but NUMBERS too!  The mix of alphanumeric is always fun because kids often see these at different entities.  Most of my kids who come to the library know their alphabet and their numbers.  However, when I explained to them that when spelled out, numbers actually have letters in them, it blew their minds!  Perhaps a little too in depth for 2-6 year olds!

     This week’s craft looked a little something like this.  Side note:  not all of the letter N’s looked the same.  I ran out of number stickers and had to improvise with glitter numbers!

Materials:  Index card with capital N, number stickers, crayons

Front of card

Back of card

1)    Color the capital N.

2)    Trace the capital and lower case Nn on the back of the card.

3)    Peel and stick those number stickers anywhere!

     The second craft this week for my older kids was really fun!  I always like to challenge this age group as much as possible.  This week’s craft, noodle necklaces, really challenged my kids on their manual dexterity skills!  It’s amazing how much hand-eye coordination is involved in string pasta on yarn.  The other amazing thing to watch is how much age matters in some of these believed to be simple tasks.  While my four year olds had a couple of problems, the five year olds were a little bit better, and most of the six year old needed little if any help.

Materials used.

The first few "beads" put on.

The finished product.  I like patterns!

Styling up our penguin with a Noodle Necklace!

     Noodle necklaces were fun because the kids were able to be creative.  I gave each kid 12 pieces of pasta.  Some shapes were dyed red, blue, green, purple, and orange.  Although I did not personally do the dying (I used materials my library already had) there are a lot of great websites out there for how to dye the shapes.  Click here for step-by-step instructions on how to dye pasta.  My necklace turned out so great, that not one person commented or asked me why I was wearing a noodle necklace for two straight days! HA!  One woman did tell me that she thought it looked like wooden beads so that might explain why!

     In sticking with my New Year’s resolution, the books I chose for this week were very fun.  For the numbers portion, I chose Bill Martin, Jr.’s Chicka Chicka 1,2,3.  Its funny how many people know of the alphabet version of this book, but have never read this numbers version.  One of the many reasons I chose this book is that it goes past 1-10 and on until 100.  Although it doesn’t cover every number from 1-100 in the text, the last page does have all the numbers if you are looking for a great visual representation.

     As for a pasta book, well, is there anything better than On Top of Spaghetti?  Now I know that this book doesn’t expressly say “noodle,” however, spaghetti are noodles and this book allowed me to sing and read, which I love to do.  There are many different version of this song out there in book form, but the one my library owns is the version written and illustrated by Paul Brett Johnson.  Like I said, I love books that incorporate a song within the story.  Not only did I get to sing and read, but there were lots of fun fake-sneezes going on as well!

     I had a really great time this week finding a new numbers song as well as noodle song!  When finding music, I always go through the list of CDs that my library offers first!  Why buy music on iTunes when I can download from a CD my library already owns?  I have been able to find a lot of great things that way, however, sometimes, I just have to bite the bullet and pay the $1.06 for a song I know my kids will love!  That what I had to do for the “Numbers Rhumba” by the Wiggles!  The song is very upbeat, educational, and great for teaching about not only numbers, but cultural music, too!

     The other great song I found in my library is called the “Noodle Dance,” by Playhouse Disney!  Now I admit that the noodle in this song is actually referring to your brain, but that works great too!  I love explaining to kids how the same word can be used to mean different things.  It’s almost like a light bulb moment when they understand!  It’s great!

The "Noodle Dance" song starts at 2:08.

     That seems to be it for this week!  Next week we tackle the letter Pp.  I can’t wait to hear what P-words my kids come up with!  Hope to see you then!

M is for.. Mice and Mustaches!

     Welcome back!  I hope the new year finds everyone healthy, wealthy, and above all, HAPPY!  I always love that start of a new year.  First of all, I always feel rejuvenated.  There is something about taking a couple of weeks off between programs that really makes me appreciate what a great job I have.  Second, the new year always bring new kids to my story time classes!  Although I love my regulars who have attended my classes from the beginning, meeting new kids and their parents are always fun, too!

     I don’t know about you, but the first week back to story time after a long break is always interesting.  This year, it seemed as if 2012 brought my brand new kids!  My shy kids were suddenly outgoing, my outgoing kids were suddenly shy.  The kids who have been coming forever seemed to forget who I was!  Once we got back into the normal routine, they all seemed to liven back up!

     Just because it’s a new year does not mean I am changing gears in terms of our alphabet mission!  I will continue with the letter-a-week theme until we get through the entire alphabet!  This means that this week we conquered the letter Mm!  There are lots of M-words, but I chose a simple one, mouse! EEEEKK! There are tons of great mice books in our library and I think the card looks so cute!

Materials:  Index card with capital M, 2 googly eyes, pink pom-pom, pipe cleaner tail, and crayons

Front of card

 

Back of card

1)    Color the capital L to look like a mouse

2)    Trace the capital and lower case Mm on the back of the card.

3)    Glue the eyes to the M. Glue the pop-pop on as the nose. Glue the tail on the bottom. Add whiskers and ears to complete your mouse!

     As usual, I continued with a second craft for my 4-6 year olds.  When I first started doing multiple craft with this age group, I thought it might be a bit too much.  My main thought for doing a second craft was that it would really reinforce the alphabet letter of the week.  Well, after one semester, I can honestly say I am glad that I did it.  My kids love crafts.  It is great to do the alphabet letter first and then the “fun, creative” craft second.  Thus without further ado, the second letter Mm craft!

     That’s right… MUSTACHES!  How fun is that?  All I did for this one was print mustaches on cardstock and cut them out.  The kids then colored them however they wanted and finished by adding a craft stick!  VOILA!  A mustache!

     My New Year’s resolution for story times was to start picking better books.  I know that the books I pull every week are age appropriate and fun, however, my kids just aren’t responding to them the way I would like.  Thus, for the next year, I am going to place a greater focus on picking books that I know they will love.  I want to have a year full of book-laughter!  Thus, this week I went with the following, Shout! Shout It Out! by Denise Fleming and Mustache! By Mac Bennett! 

 

     Fleming’s book is great for the 2-5 year old crowds because it involves a bit of call-and-response.  I don’t know about your kids, however, the kids that come to my classes always have a case of the wiggles!  This just gives them a good excuse to shout out the answers as I point to them.  As for Barnett’s book, well, who doesn’t love a good book about mustaches?  Especially when the whole plot revolves around drawing mustaches on pictures of the king?

     Another thing I have decided to try to do this year is add a little more kid-friendly contemporary music!  Songs for kids are great, but there are a lot of popular songs out there that can work well with my themes, too.  Brian Setzer’s song, “Rockin’ at the House of Mouse,” fit the agenda easily!  Was this a song written expressly for children?  No!  But does it work! FOR SURE!  I was really excited to add this element and I hope I am able to continue to find great songs!

    Sidenote: I had NO IDEA that this was the theme song for a Mickey Mouse show until I did this YouTube search!

     Well, that seems to be it for this week's installment!  If you haven't all ready, take a look at this week's video!  Sammy and I had a lot of fun with out mustaches!  Hope to see you next week when we cover the letter N!  Any guess as to what it may be?